I wish I could claim this idea as my own…but I can’t. I saw a picture of these adorable santa hat brownie bites somewhere on Pinterest and thought to myself, “I’m making those for sure!” So, I did….for the party that we had on Friday (which was a great success by the way!)
I never went back to find out how the person had done it, because I thought it was pretty self-explanatory. And…I make my grandmother’s amazing brownie recipe all the time, so that was a no-brainer too. Someone told me the other day they’d heard of this done with cool whip, but I made homemade cream cheese icing which is tastier and stickier too (to hold the berry in place.)
So here’s my Mema’s brownie recipe. I normally make it in a 9×13 pan and bake at 350 for 25 minutes, but this time I used mini muffin tins and baked for around 18 minutes. Make sure you spray your muffin tins so these will fall out when they’re done!
To make the best and easiest brownies ever, you’ll need:
- 4 sq (4 oz) unsweet Baker’s chocolate (comes in an orange box in the baking section)
- 2 sticks butter
- 2 c. sugar
- 4 eggs
- 1 c. flour
- 1 tsp vanilla (I always just squirt the vanilla in, so it’s probably way more than 1 tsp…I’m generous with vanilla like that!)
Put the chocolate and butter into a microwave safe dish and melt on high for about 3 1/2 minutes. When that’s done, stir it up well to make sure the chocolate squares melted completely. Then add and incorporate sugar, then eggs, then vanilla, and finally flour. Don’t overmix. I always just do this by hand…less to wash and it’s so easy anyhow. Pour into whatever baking vessel you choose and bake at 350…for about 18 minutes in mini-muffin tins, 25 in a 9×13 pan, and 35-40 in an 8×8 if you like a thicker brownie. A toothpick should come out pretty clean in the center of the pan. I like mine slightly underdone though…just slightly…to make them really fudgy.
To make cream cheese frosting:
- 2 (8 ounce) packages cream cheese, softened
- 1/2 cup butter, softened
- 2 cups sifted confectioners’ sugar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
In a medium bowl, cream together the cream cheese and butter until creamy. Mix in the vanilla, then gradually stir in the confectioners’ sugar. Store in the refrigerator after use.
For the santa hat bites, wash, dry, and cap your strawberries (they need to be really good and dry so they don’t make everything runny.)
Use a ziploc bag with a small corner cut off to pipe the icing onto the brownie. I found it worked best to not cover the entire brownie…start at the outside and make a circle of icing. (I left a small space in the center to give the icing room to spread out when you put the berry on top.) Stick the berry on top, and then pipe a small dollop of frosting onto the point of the berry. Keep refrigerated until you’re ready to serve!
These were crazy good and so cute to have at the party! I made an entire tray and could’ve eaten them all! So so good! Tried one with a raspberry too, and while it didn’t look like a Santa hat…it was pretty tasty as well!
so cute! Love em’ & LOVE you!
Those are adorable Logan! What a great idea.
There are a couple of variations for this that I found. One person used melted white chocolate and the other used something called Mascarpone Buttercream. I think I am going to try yours because I think that the cream cheese frosting will go real well with the brownies and strawberries. Thanks!